Koala Joey Holding a Branch Coloring Page

A koala joey holds onto a branch with both front paws and looks straight out at you. It is sitting up rather than clinging flat, which makes the whole animal visible instead of half hidden against a trunk.

The ears are the feature. They are enormous, round and set wide on the head, and each one is drawn with a fan of soft strokes radiating out toward the rim, so there is real texture there without anything being filled in. Between them the face is simple: two round eyes, one large rounded nose and a short smile.

The body is left almost entirely open. The branch runs up through the lower half of the sheet with two large leaves on it, and there is no forest behind, which keeps the page from turning busy.

Gray is correct and looks good, but the ears are where the sheet rewards a second thought. Leaving the fan of strokes pale and taking only the outer rim darker gives the ears the fluffiness they are drawn to have. Filling them solid loses all of it.

The nose takes a deep tone and is worth doing last, because it anchors the whole face once everything around it is already colored.